Music for the Masses by Depeche Mode

Music for the Masses, Depeche Mode's sixth studio album, landed on 28 September 1987, on Mute in Britain and Sire in America, and the title turned out to be less of a joke than it looked. Following on from Black Celebration, it was co-produced by the band with David Bascombe, cut in Paris and London and mixed in Denmark, and it's the first Depeche Mode record where Alan Wilder took charge of the production. You can hear his hand all over it: the machines sound bigger, colder and more cavernous than ever, a widescreen synth-pop that still keeps its gaze fixed on the dark stuff.

"Never Let Me Down Again" is the colossus, a slow, stomping, rising thing that feels built for stadium floodlights. "Strangelove" pulses with sleek, dark menace, "Behind the Wheel" purrs along with a coiled, mechanical groove, and "Little 15", "Sacred", "Pleasure Little Treasure" and "I Want You Now" fill out a record that swings between chapel hush and nightclub throb. Anton Corbijn's videos and photographs gave the whole thing a new, stark look to match.

This was the record that finally cracked America for them. It climbed to number 2 in West Germany, while Britain took it to number 10 and America to number 35, went platinum in the US in 1991, and has sold more than five million copies worldwide. The 1987 to 1988 tour behind it reached the Rose Bowl in Pasadena in front of more than 70,000 people, a triumph captured on the live album and film 101, and the album later inspired a tribute record, For the Masses.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.